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Issue no. 8, 2004 Published: Mar 05, 2004
Microsoft linked to SCO funding
SCO wins Linux licence payments
EU probes memory price-fixing charge
US pressing China to yield on wireless encryption
Philips' liquid lens works like human eye
Miniature fuel cells may oust batteries
Nanotube mix makes liquid crystal
Model keeps virtual eyes right
Microwaves could heat up security searches
New DNA chip test targets food fraudsters
Film promises terabit storage
Half of all spam is American, says study

Microsoft linked to SCO funding
Conspiracy theorists convinced that Microsoft is behind SCO's legal campaign against Linux were rewarded yesterday by a leaked e-mail that seemed to back up their theories. The e-mail was sent to SCO's vice president and general manager of SCOsource, Chris Sontag, by Mike Anderer, CEO of SCO consultant S2 Partners LLC. It discusses the potential for SCO to raise money from Microsoft via neutral third parties. S2's message, CC'd to SCO chief financial officer Bob Bench, also implies BayStar Capital, which last year ploughed $50m into SCO, is connected to Microsoft. The e-mail is dated October 12, four days before SCO announced Bay Star's investment. Rumours, denied by all concerned at the time, had circulated that Microsoft backed the funding. The e-mail, apparently leaked by a whistle blowing SCO employee, was posted on open source website OpenSource.com. SCO confirmed the authenticity of the e-mail, but called it 'speculation' that Microsoft participated in the BayStar transaction. In a statement, Microsoft denied any 'direct or indirect financial relationship with BayStar'.
Computerwire Mar 05, 2004	back to top

SCO wins Linux licence payments
A bitter legal row over who owns key parts of the Linux operating system has entered a new phase. US company EV1 Servers has bought a licence to use Linux from SCO, which claims that some its intellectual property has been illegally included in the open source software. EV1 bought the licence even though SCO's claim to own some of the code inside Linux has yet to be tested by the US courts. SCO said other companies had bought licences for Linux but, so far, EV1 was the only one willing to go public. In March 2003 SCO filed a lawsuit against IBM alleging that IBM had illegally put some of its Unix computer code into Linux. IBM has disputed the claim and is countersuing. In related news SCO has announced the first copyright infringement lawsuits against car parts retailer AutoZone and car maker DaimlerChrysler. SCO is seeking damages for unauthorised use of its intellectual property.
BBC News Mar 03, 2004	back to top

EU probes memory price-fixing charge
The EU is investigating whether the world's largest memory makers conspired to raise chip prices in 2001, mirroring a probe being conducted by the US Department of Justice. The probe focuses on whether memory manufacturers such as Micron, Samsung and Infineon colluded to drive up prices in late 2001. At that time, the PC market was shrinking, but prices for DRAM and double data rate DRAM - the type of memory found in the vast majority of PCs - were skyrocketing. Some types of memory tripled in price in a few months. The shift raised eyebrows. Even in good times, memory prices often drop because of excess manufacturing capacity worldwide. At various times in the past five years, some memory manufacturers have had to sell chips at below manufacturing costs. During the same period, several companies exited the business or sold off fabrication facilities.
CNET News Mar 02, 2004	back to top

US pressing China to yield on wireless encryption
The US stepped up its pressure on China to back off its plan to impose a software encryption standard for wireless computers that US companies regard as an unfair trade barrier. In a letter, Secretary of Commerce Donald L. Evans, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell and the White House trade representative, Robert B. Zoellick, expressed their concern about the plan and urged China to work with the US to resolve the issue. The wireless encryption issue, analysts say, points to what may be a trend of China setting its own exclusive standards, including formats for future generations of cellphones and DVD players. This week's letter refers only to the Chinese software standard for short-range wireless networks, or Wi-Fi. In December, China announced that foreign computer and chip makers that want to sell Wi-Fi devices in China would have to use Chinese encryption software and co-produce their goods with Chinese companies on a designated list. Foreign computer makers have protested the plan, which will take effect on June 1.
New York Times Mar 04, 2004	back to top

Philips' liquid lens works like human eye
Philips Electronics says it has invented a tiny digital camera lens to fit inside a mobile phone that can focus on objects and create sharp pictures in ways that are similar to the human eye. Unlike high-end digital cameras, the new lens does not require mechanical moving parts because it works by manipulating two fluids in a tiny transparent tube. Philips said it will build a production line for the three millimetre lenses that are aimed at low-cost imaging products, such as digital cameras that fit inside a mobile phone or a home security system. By charging the sides of the tube with an small electric current, one of the two fluids is drawn to the edges while the other fluid fills up the remaining space in the tube. The place where the two fluids meet, functions like a lens. By changing the current, this lens can be shaped hollow, curvex or anything in between, so that it can focus on objects far away or as close as five centimetres.
Reuters Mar 04, 2004	back to top

Miniature fuel cells may oust batteries
A trick that boosts the power of miniature hydrogen fuel cells by up to 50 per cent has been revealed by US researchers. Engineers at Stanford University in California found they can dramatically increase efficiency by shrinking the channels that deliver fuel to the cell's heart. The fuel cell contains a polymer-based 'proton exchange membrane' sandwiched between an anode and cathode layer, each containing a platinum catalyst. Hydrogen travels to the anode through a polymer block bored with channels. At the anode, the platinum helps break the hydrogen down into protons and electrons. The protons cross the membrane and react with oxygen and electrons from the cathode, and this drives the electrons left at the anode around an electrical circuit to the cathode. The researchers used a microchip etching process to bore channels just 20 micrometres wide. The effect was to increase the speed at which the hydrogen is delivered and prevent the anode being flooded with fuel. This boosted the rate of proton exchange and increased the fuel cell's power by half as much again.
New Scientist Mar 04, 2004	back to top

Nanotube mix makes liquid crystal
Researchers from the University of Cambridge in England have found that carbon nanotubes can be mixed with a solvent to form a liquid crystal. Carbon nanotubes are rolled-up sheets of carbon atoms that can be as narrow as 0.4 nanometres. They have useful electrical and mechanical properties and are a leading player in nanotechnology. Liquid crystal forms an ordered structure like a crystal along one dimension, but acts like a liquid in the other two. The researchers' method opens the possibility of processing materials made from carbon nanotubes in ways similar to those used for existing materials like rigid chain polymers, or plastics. Carbon nanotubes may eventually enable ultrasensitive sensors, super-dense computer memory, and molecular-scale electronics. The researchers' method also provides a way to more closely examine the structure of the liquid crystalline state. Liquid crystals are commonly used in computer displays.
Technology Review / TRN Mar 03, 2004	back to top

Model keeps virtual eyes right
Researchers from the University of Southern California have developed a computer simulation of the areas in the primate brain that perform initial visual processing, and have used the neurobiological model to produce realistic automatic head and eye movements in a virtual model of a human head. The model shows that the process that drives people to look at interesting things in a scene uses very basic neural feature detectors modelled after those in primate brains to direct attention to particular objects within a view. Feature detectors recognize a few simple features, like motion, colour, bright spots, and edges. The model commits to looking in a particular direction depending on which type of visually responsive neural detectors exhibit an unusual level of activity. The biologically-based all-purpose model is different from traditional computer vision approaches, which use specific algorithms designed for a given environment, like the indoors, a freeway, or Mars, and given targets, like people, cars or guns.
Technology Review / TRN Mar 01, 2004	back to top

Microwaves could heat up security searches
Instead of just zapping frozen dinners and heating meals, microwaves could be used in security operations to image concealed weapons, according to British researchers at Northumbria University. The scientists are developing a technique to produce three-dimensional images using microwaves for airport security checks and in medicine. Unlike X-rays which can cause damage to human tissue, microwaves are harmless and could be used to find hidden objects carried by people. The researchers use computer software to construct three-dimensional images of patterns made by microwaves scattered when they come in contact with a hidden object. Although the research is still at an early stage, the ultimate aim is to produce an alternative, 3D microwave imaging technique that can be used across a wide range of disciplines.
Reuters Mar 02, 2004	back to top

New DNA chip test targets food fraudsters
A new test could soon be assuring consumers that their hamburgers are all beef and that nothing extra has been added to their chicken or foie gras pate. Britain's Food Standards Agency (FSA) is evaluating the FoodExpert-ID test developed by California-based Affymetrix and France's biotech firm BioMerieux. Trials in other European countries are planned for later this year. The test, based on a DNA chip, is designed to outsmart food fraudsters. One of its first applications of the test is expected to be in the cattle feed industry to make sure no illegal animal remains, which might spread BSE, are fed to animals. Affymetrix said the FoodExpert-ID will be the first gene chip, or microarray, for mainstream use. It is a small glass plate containing fragments of DNA that can be used to screen tens of thousands of individual DNA pieces for certain genes. Until now the technology has been used mainly in laboratory research.
Reuters Mar 03, 2004	back to top

Film promises terabit storage
Scientists are looking to cram more information in a given area by finding ways to store the 1s and 0s of computer information in single molecules. Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences have taken a step in this direction by synthesizing an organic material, spreading it into a molecule-thick layer, and recording marks as small as 1.1 nanometres in the medium. The presence of a mark can represent a 1 and the absence of a mark, 0. The 1.1-nanometer marks, spaced 1.5 nanometres apart, would yield a data storage density of more than 10 trillion bits per square centimetre, being the equivalent of 266 DVDs worth of data. The researchers previously had recorded marks as small as 0.6 nanometres in an organic thin film, but that material was not as readily controlled or as stable as the current material. The researchers' new material is stable in air, and has a higher melting point - 172 Celsius - than the researchers' previous recording medium.
Technology Review / TRN Mar 02, 2004	back to top

Half of all spam is American, says study
The US is by far the leading originator of most of the spam, according to UK antivirus company Sophos. However, the broad international spread of junk mail senders underscores the difficulty of combating spam with national laws, Sophos said. Moreover, many spam senders may not even be aware they are sending the messages, their PCs having been hijacked by the real culprits from across international borders. The US accounted for more than half of all spam received, at 56.7 per cent, Sophos said, with Canada a distant second place at 6.8 per cent. The top-ranked European country was the Netherlands at 2.1 per cent. The top-ranked European spammers - the Netherlands, Germany, France, the UK and Spain - together accounted for 7.8 per cent of all spam received. Sophos arrived at the figures by analysing hundreds of thousands of emails received over two days last week in various locations around the globe. Sophos said that many of the US computers originating spam appear to be controlled by hackers in Russia and elsewhere.
Silicon.com / ZDNet UK Mar 01, 2004	back to top